


When I was older, I was a sailor on an open sea

by Toomanyfandoms99



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Childhood Friends, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Artist Steve Rogers, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Childhood Friends, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 12:47:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19151320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Toomanyfandoms99/pseuds/Toomanyfandoms99
Summary: Steve had a purpose in this branch timeline.  He had a mission that had just become clear to him.The mission: save Tony Stark from a lifetime of suffering.Will he accept?





	When I was older, I was a sailor on an open sea

**Author's Note:**

> This is my headcanon for Avengers: Endgame. The title was taken from the song “When I Was Older” by Billie Eilish. Enjoy!

Steve never thought he would get to travel through space and time.

He couldn’t quite wrap his mind around it, but he wasn’t a supersoldier anymore. His sole purpose wasn’t to protect and destroy during unwinnable wars. 

(There was no such thing as a perfect war.)

He fought aliens in a future New York City. He knew about a man who grew larger — and greener — when he was angry. He knew about guardians of the galaxy, an empath with antennas, and a trash talking raccoon. He knew about a woman who could destroy space armies with glowing fists.

Compared to them, he wasn’t so special. 

That’s why his purpose, his new assigned one, was to ensure that the eclectic group of heroes had the life he never did. The normal life that was stolen from him in a plane crash.

He returned the stones with the intent of never coming back. He fully believed that he would die on his journey, but hopefully when the final stone was back in its place.

(The Soul Stone, he thought, would be the end of him. Natasha died for it, and he was sure he would too.)

After a perilous journey through time and space, Steve was ready to fall off the cliff on Vormir and give the Red Skull exactly what he wanted. But a fleeting thought drove him away, backpedaling off the ledge before he could fall.

Two jumps were left, and Steve knew exactly what he wanted to do.

————

The intent had been Peggy.

But what Steve got was something entirely different.

————

Steve Rogers was three years old when he met Tony Stark.

It was 1973, and despite the overseas war threatening to strangle America, New York was as vibrant as it had ever been.

Steve was an old man in a boy’s body, but no one seemed to notice.

(His mother was here, his sweet wonderful mother, so this world could be worse.)

It was strange for a billionaire boy to be in regular daycare with the other children. However, Steve recalled Tony’s hatred for his father’s neglect and abuse. It was better Tony be here than at home.

(Steve still found it strange that the Howard he knew was a monster now.)

Steve played the part of an innocent child in daycare, drawing with crayons on any paper he could find. He purposefully drew outside the lines on pictures, and created uneven caricatures of happy children and houses and flowers.

Eventually, Tony started in on wooden building blocks, creating the base for a castle with calculating eyes. It was the same look of concentration he had when tinkering with his iron suit.

(Steve thinks it must be exhausting to be a genius.)

Steve paused in his drawing of a jagged sunflower, nowhere near as detailed as he could be, especially with proper schooling.

(He went to art school online after the Battle of New York. It was Tony who offered to pay the small fee, since it was a mere penny in an ocean of endless wealth for him.)

He slowly crawled towards the boy across the play mat, his big brown eyes darting from block to block as he built a structurally-sound castle.

Steve plopped his small body across from the blocks, observing Tony quietly for a moment.

(He did the same thing at Avengers Tower, sometimes. Watched Tony work on several tasks at once, mouth running as fast as his mind.)

“That’s amazing,” Steve found himself murmuring, awestruck how Tony could create something marvelous out of hardly anything at all.

Tony froze, his eyes huge and trapped in a state of surprise. Steve saw his eyes looking at him for the first time, through a rectangular hole in his design, meant to be a window at the top of a tower.

Tony analyzed him for a few beats, as if unsure why Steve was speaking to him.

“O-oh?” Tony stammered, almost soft enough that Steve’s ears didn’t pick up the sound.

It hit Steve like a flash. The realization that Tony must not speak to kids his own age, and was socially awkward because of it. He was most likely isolated in the Stark mansion, hardly speaking to anyone. What that could do to an impressionable mind, Steve could only guess.

Steve had a purpose in this branch timeline. He had a mission that had just become clear to him.

The mission: save Tony Stark from a lifetime of suffering.

Will he accept?

Steve smiled at the boy his age. “Can you teach me how you did that?”

Tony blinked, analyzing the scrawny boy across from him and deciding he wasn’t a threat. Tony began to speak rapid instructions, and Steve listened to him ramble.

He will accept the mission.

————

Steve was seven years old when he saw the bruises on his arms.

There was a purplish mark on his forearm, as if he were grabbed by a hand much larger than his. The hand had taken hold of his entire arm and squeezed. Thumb marks were still visible within the bruise.

There was a matching mark on Tony’s opposite wrist, like someone had grasped there and squeezed hard enough that he wanted to tug his hand away, but couldn’t. The person holding his wrist was far stronger than little Tony.

Steve knew he couldn’t betray his childlike innocence. Tony said he fell, and was pushed, and he accepted the excuse. Steve offered to clean the wounds so they wouldn’t get agitated, and Tony allowed him to place bandages over his bruises.

The false injuries only increased as they aged together. The worst was when they were eleven, finally transferring over to middle school. Tony ran to the apartment he shared with his mother at eleven at night. Steve was having trouble sleeping, because his powers were gone here and his medical issues remained.

(Nowhere near as horrible as they were in his first life, but still a nuisance.)

Tony had climbed the staircase landing four flights up the apartment building. He knocked on the window and gave Steve a slight heart attack. Steve slid open his window, and Tony slipped inside his room.

Tony’s face caught against the light of Steve’s lamp, and Steve’s breath hitched.

An entire half of his face was a swollen welt, and his opposite ear had a bleeding slice underneath the earlobe.

(He recognized the scar from his first life. Tony said that it was a piece of glass from a beer bottle that did it. Steve always thought he meant Tony inflicted the wound on himself, but it was Howard all along.)

“Sit,” Steve breathed. “Hang on.”

Despite his asthma acting up, and his heart beating a million times per second, Steve stumbled out of his bedroom and to the bathroom across the hall. He made sure he was quiet as he buried his fingers into the bathroom cabinet. He found the extensive array of supplies that his mother kept close by in case he had an emergency. 

He brought them back into his bedroom, and Tony now sat on the edge of his mattress. He was utterly silent — in an unnerving way — as Steve patched him up delicately.

When it was over, and Tony’s pale face hurt Steve’s heart, he said, “come here any time this happens. I’ll help you. Okay?”

Tony’s lip trembled, and he put a hand over his mouth. Tears welled in his eyes, and he made stifled sobbing noises.

Steve opened his palm, and placed it over the hand on Tony’s mouth. Tony closed his eyes, exhaling for the first time in forever. He sank into Steve’s touch, and Steve bit his lip so his own emotions wouldn’t spill over.

Tony nodded, and Steve enlisted his mother’s discreet help. She always made sure to have medical supplies, and if they were tight on cash, to take some from the hospital where she worked.

(Tony tried to help with his allowances, but owning an apartment in New York City was getting harder for paying bills.)

Every time Tony came to him with bruises, Steve wondered.

If he did not exist in the original timeline, who did Tony have to save him?

No one.

————

A strange thing happened to Steve’s mind at age thirteen.

In his first life, he was too busy coughing up blood and being strung to IV drips to care about normal teenage things. Like girls. Or acing that test. Or getting a driver’s license.

Now that his medical issues decreased in his second life, his mind actually wandered, and he allowed it.

He thought Peggy was the one for him. He tried to search for her, in moments when he wasn’t being watched, but she didn’t seem to exist. If she did, perhaps she changed her name. 

(Branch timelines were tricky. He had gleaned that much from Bruce’s hurried explanation before he left Sam and Bucky in charge.)

But it soon became clear to Steve that Peggy wasn’t supposed to be his future. At least not this future.

It was a boy who cursed in Italian and rambled about science and had a collection of scars underneath his shirt. It was a boy who was now a teenager and trusted Steve more than anyone else. It was a boy meant to inherit a horrible man’s fortune and turn blood money into something beneficial to help the world.

It was a boy who would become Tony Stark, the Iron Man, destined to die so that Natasha’s sacrifice — and the sacrifices of countless others — would not be in vain.

And Steve was not ashamed to say it: he loved Tony Stark.

His mission was to save Tony as best as he could from his toxic upbringing. It was why he was forced into this timeline.

(He still had one jump left. He would not use it until he was near death, to get back to his original home. Until then, he had to play the long game.)

Something changed along the way. He had no choice but to roll the dice on the board game and step on one cobblestone at a time. In the process of playing this game, Steve’s heart had grown fond of his charge.

He realized it when they were thirteen, and working on homework in his room. Tony had observed the oxygen tank and tubes wrapped around it, then sat cautiously beside it. Their history textbooks were between them, and since Tony didn’t pay attention in that class, it was up to Steve to teach him.

(He was, in himself, a part of history. Tony was none the wiser. He just thought Steve was good at history.)

Tony uncapped a marker and wrote on flash cards. “What do I gotta know, Stevie?” He asked, leaning down and preparing to copy the events he needed for the test.

The light spilling over from the curtains hit Tony at just the right angle, half of his tan skin seeming to glow from the sun. Rays of gold were present in his brown eyes, which Steve had never noticed before. His hair, in its constant disarray, was starting to droop on Tony’s forehead, against his thick eyebrows. The scar under his ear and below his jaw were almost invisible here, a thin white line that Steve had to squint to see. His lips were chapped, and as a result, Tony worried the corner of his mouth. His tongue stuck out a little, waiting for Steve to speak.

And Steve found that he could not.

It took a beat longer than normal for Steve to surpass the lump in his throat, a barrier between his voice box and esophagus. He found that he could not recall the terms, and he had to blink to remember himself.

“Steve?” Tony realized Steve was eerily quiet, and glanced up, the full weight of his gaze and furrowed brows on him.

Steve had to mime a soft cough, directing his attention to the bedspread.

It was 1983. It was too early for falling in love with a boy.

“Are you alright?” Tony asked, his eyes expressing gentle concern.

“I’m fine,” Steve managed, his lungs expanding and collapsing at their normal rate.

If only he could tell the same thing to his heart.

————

Reliving high school was hell for Steve.

The Great Depression halted most education systems, so he was blessed to be free early. The world had been put on hold for a long time, but Steve knew he would not be so lucky in his second life.

Although Tony was constantly being watched by paparazzi and propositioned by rich kids, he remained true to himself. True to Steve.

Steve was not an idiot. He was the reason why Tony wasn’t already an alcoholic. He was the only stability that Tony had. If something were to happen to Steve, or their friendship, it would tip Tony over the edge. 

Tony as an adult was brash and impulsive. This Tony could be different, but erasing a personality was unlikely. The building blocks of Tony, as far as Steve knew, were still there.

Even though Steve got himself into scrapes nearly every week defending a kid weaker or younger than himself, Tony was right there with him, scaring bullies away. 

(It was a relationship he once had with Bucky, and the thought stilled his heart. It was best he not think about his past life.)

Tony wasn’t afraid to join the science or robotics clubs, even though they were meant for nerds. If another rich kid tried to tease Tony, he would say being a genius was in his blood and punch their lights out. 

(They were similar in the visceral way that they fought, and it took Steve this long to realize it.)

Tony encouraged Steve to pursue art, and he found himself improving, even at a younger age. Experience did help, it seemed.

Steve hated getting into scuffles, but he was happy with Tony as his best friend. Despite Tony having a million other places to be, he chose to spend his time being a normal teenager, hanging out in Steve’s room and doing homework, like the responsible kids they were.

The world stopped, however, when they were sixteen years of age. 

His mother died, and Steve had to relive Sarah Rogers’ death twice over. It nearly sucked the wind out of his sails as he was transported into a foster home.

Nearly.

Tony was there through it all. Sarah had become a second mother to Tony as well, and he felt the pain as keenly as Steve did. It helped having someone around that understood.

Steve was in a horrible foster home, but an anonymous donation soon improved the living conditions. 

(He had no idea how Tony got partial access to his fortune.)

Despite the hardships, Steve felt like he could get through it with Tony there. Tony practically lived at the foster home with him, and no one commented on his sudden appearances. 

(Steve thinks the majority of the workers know what an abused child looks like, regardless of status.)

————

Turning eighteen was a relief for both of them. It was like the world finally decided to give them a break to breathe.

Unfortunately, college truly separated the two of them for the first time since they were three years old. Tony went to MIT, and Steve went to the New York Academy of Art. However, Steve clung onto Tony, because if he didn’t, they would both break.

Not just Tony. He would break too.

They talked on the phone as if nothing had changed. Steve missed the absence of Tony’s presence in front of him, but this would do. Tony would ramble, Steve would listen. It was their way.

Tony would cross state lines whenever he could on his motorcycle to see Steve in person. Every time he saw Tony in his leather ensemble, his throat would close and his heart would skip a beat.

(It turned out he had an affinity for bad boys.)

They would talk about school and how any new people they met dulled in comparison to each other. Normal friend stuff.

(As in this was totally not normal. Steve knew it, Tony did not.)

Tony’s obliviousness to Steve’s true feelings made him curl in on himself like a tortoise hiding in its shell.

It was 1989, and they were nineteen years old. It was too early to fall in love in this world, and too late to reveal his love for Tony Stark.

This was the statement Steve told himself throughout his second life, and while it had been revised, the core of the message remained.

————

It was 1991, Steve reminded himself.

It was 1991, and Tony’s life was turned upside down. Exactly on schedule. On the right date, at the right time.

He spent the morning of December 16th genuinely thinking that this reality would be different. That in this branch timeline, Tony wouldn’t have his parents taken away from him.

He tricked himself into thinking it, and Tony paid the price.

(Steve knew he couldn’t have stopped it, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t have tried warning them.)

Steve was there in a flash, watching Tony’s numb form in the mansion backyard. His legs were dipped into the ice cold pool water, and he didn’t seem to understand that it was midnight.

Steve sat beside Tony, his hand clasping over his shoulder. Tony blinked, the first sign of life he had given anyone in hours. 

(Steve couldn’t help but feel pleased at that.)

“Jarvis,” Tony said softly. His eyes glistened, and his face crumpled. “Why is no one talking about Jarvis?”

Steve frowned, and rubbed a spot on Tony’s upper back. He offered with finality, “because the world is a shitty place.”

“Yeah,” Tony said bitterly, “got that right.”

Tony suddenly rested his head on Steve’s shoulder, and for a brief second, his heart stopped.

“You’re awesome, Steve,” Tony murmured. “You know that, right?”

Steve did not know that. But now he did.

————

Tony got him a job at Stark Industries. Steve knew he had no choice but to take it.

Tony marked him as a consultant, but Steve knew his job title should actually say Emotional Support Friend.

If Tony ever wavered as head of Stark Industries, it was Steve that delivered the ethical and moral reasons why he should or should not make a certain decision. Whenever he wasn’t on Tony’s radar, he was allowed space in an off-limits area to further his art career.

(Having a rich friend meant he never ran out of art supplies.)

Steve soon found himself connected with all the right people, and those people gave him an art gallery. By this point, it was 1995, and Steve was bold enough to make a move.

It was still too early and too late simultaneously, but Steve decided to do it.

The circumstances were after his gallery opening, and Steve had bids on most of his paintings. He focused mainly on depicting warzones, ones that he knew well but the people buying them were not alive to question. 

(Tony had asked him about the fixation once, but Steve changed the subject smoothly.)

It was two in the morning, and New York City was dark and dangerous. Steve decided to sleep in the gallery room, and Tony joined him.

It was just them, and glass walls, and paintings, and darkness.

Steve said, “you know I love you, right?”

Tony, who sat beside him on the wood paneling and blankets, glanced towards him with furrowed brows. “Love you too, Steve,” he said breezily.

And no, that just wasn’t right.

“No,” Steve enunciated, “I mean it.”

He stared into Tony’s eyes, and Tony stared back.

He got it a moment later, and his eyes widened in realization.

“We,” Tony whispered, “but we can’t.”

It was 1995, Steve knew that. It was 1995, and Steve couldn’t help but smile.

“I know,” he said gently. “I just wanted you to know.”

“Stevie,” Tony murmured, “we can’t.”

“I know,” Steve repeated quietly. If they spoke any louder, it would become real. “We can’t.”

Tony worried his lip, and he stared hopelessly into his lap. “Why,” he started, and stopped.

When he looked back up, his eyes glistened.

“Why would you tell me?” Tony asked, almost inaudible. He looked devastated and defeated.

Steve matched his agony with a half-smile. “I thought you should know. I expect nothing to come of it, but I needed you to know that. We won’t speak of it again.”

“I can’t pretend this didn’t happen,” Tony said, his eyes filled with fire. “I refuse to pretend.”

“I’m not asking you to pretend,” Steve said softly.

“Steve,” Tony whispered brokenly, “why can’t we love each other?”

Steve pursed his lips. The question was so loaded that he didn’t know where to begin. He could answer that it’s society’s fault. He could say the world isn’t ready yet.

Steve chose to say, “I never said we couldn’t love each other. We already do.”

Tony blinked, comprehending their friendship in a single beat. “We do,” he murmured numbly, “don’t we?”

Steve smiled wanly. “And that’s that.”

————

Steve was surprised it took this long for both of them to act.

It was 2005, an entire decade after their conversation, and neither had spoken of it since. They simply kept on with their lives, minus the whole seeking-a-romantic-partner thing.

It was in 2005 when the paparazzi started talking louder than before. The media — and technology — had advanced exponentially with the new millennia. They were stalking Tony like never before, tabloids asking about his love life and gossip magazines declaring he was an alien for not being interested in anyone.

(Tony could have whoever he wanted. Steve thought it was sweet that he pledged himself so intensely to Steve, even though their friendship stayed the same.)

It all came to a head when Tony was hounded at a press conference about his private life. Tony put on his best fake smile and didn’t answer. 

The encounter affected Tony more than he let on. Steve found him staring into space in his office more and more often. He was so deep in thought that Steve had to snap his fingers in front of Tony’s face several times.

During one loud finger snap, Tony blinked over at him with something meaningful in his eyes.

It was 2005, and they were thirty five years old, and it was both too early and too late.

But Tony didn’t seem to think so.

Tony’s entire body seemed to ache, the devastated expression from the gallery opening a decade earlier returning at last. His golden brown eyes darted across Steve’s face, and Steve would dare to say it expressed pure fondness.

“Steve,” Tony whispered, their eyes meeting, “I’m tired of waiting.”

Steve’s eyes widened on pure instinct. He forgot how to breathe for the longest seconds of his life.

“Then,” Steve said breathlessly, “we stop waiting.”

Something clicked, something passing between them in a jolt. They leaned forward at the same time, and their eyes shut.

Their lips touched, and Steve was lost.

————

Steve went through an emotional wringer for months.

It was 2007, the year he had dreaded for far too long. Tony was kidnapped in Afghanistan, and Steve knew he was in a cave somewhere, becoming the hero he was meant to become.

(A part of Steve hurt that he couldn’t be there for Tony. Not for this.)

Tony was found, just when Steve was beginning to crumble under the weight of living in constant numbness. Pepper and Rhodey tried to help alleviate his worries, but they didn’t know Tony like Steve knew him. 

(They didn’t understand why Steve was so distraught, either. They wouldn’t know the truth for a long while.)

Seeing Tony as the plane landed had Steve nearly falling to his knees in tears. Tony’s arm was in a sling, and he had bandages on his face, and it reminded him of patching up Tony as a child.

The look in Tony’s eyes was the look Steve was used to seeing in his first life. That fire, that need to fix the world.

Heroes were forged in war. They were made of fire and smoke and blood. Steve learned that lesson well as a soldier.

Tony was a soldier now, too. A soldier made of iron and good intentions.

But with that war came trauma. Steve’s was so faint and faraway that he hardly remembered it.

Tony’s was as fresh as his wounds, and Steve stuck close. Even though Tony tried to push him away, Steve was there. He was just as stubborn as Tony, and knew he needed Steve more than ever.

————

Steve knew what was about to happen at this press conference was legendary.

When he returned to New York City after his hibernation in the Arctic, Nick Fury had given him all the news and history books needed to catch up. One of the files included was the very video about to be recorded in this timeline.

Tony was sitting silently as Pepper fixed his makeup. Rhodey was staring at the television, and Steve was across from Tony, on a loveseat. 

When some powder was applied to cover a cut, Tony said, “can you both leave me with Steve for a minute?”

Pepper and Rhodey shared a look, then closed the door behind them.

“I’m going to tell everyone,” Tony said, his eyes piercing through Steve.

“I know,” Steve said resolutely.

Tony’s eyebrow quirked upwards. “How?”

“Because I know you,” Steve replied.

(It was getting harder and harder to not seem crazy when he spoke with such conviction. Half of the time, he expected Tony to call him a malevolent psychic for seeming to know everything. So far, Tony passed it off as encouragement.)

The statement made Tony half-smile. “I’m the Iron Man. Are you okay with me being in danger?”

“You’ve always been in danger,” Steve pointed out. “At least you can protect yourself better.”

A softness reached Tony’s gaze, and he murmured, “you’re too good to me, you know that?”

Steve leaned towards Tony and pressed a delicate kiss to his lips. Tony seemed to relax at the motion, a little sigh leaving his mouth as Steve pulled back.

Steve said, “I want you to teach me. If you’re doing this, I refuse to be your damsel.”

Tony’s mouth pulled back into a wry grin. “Steve Rogers,” he murmured, “you’re nobody’s damsel.”

————

There was no new Captain America in this world. 

Steve was genuinely surprised there wasn’t another person who could act as a symbol for truth, justice, and the American way.

The other part of him was glad, however. He was doing just fine as a man of iron.

Since Steve knew all the ways things could go wrong, he lightly cautioned Tony against certain actions. It was a branch timeline, and Steve was sure nothing would ruin the original timeline.

There was a Battle of New York in 2012. That was something that could not be stopped. 

There was no Ultron. There was no Civil War. There was no Ivan Vanko or Aldrich Killian. There was no Alexander Pierce or Crossbones or Baron Zemo.

There was no Captain America. Only Iron Men.

Thanos, though, would still come. In every universe, in every timeline, Thanos would pose a threat.

Steve paid more attention during the war than he let on to most people. He had five years to catalogue between fights exactly what occurred when Thanos destroyed the world.

He knew he couldn’t stop all of it, but he could try his best. Tony spent his free time helping Steve with his medical issues. He was stronger now than he was as a child. He wasn’t a supersoldier, but he wasn’t helpless either.

As the world began to accept them, in the year 2012, they finally revealed their relationship. Steve and Tony didn’t let the tabloids bother them anymore, since they chose to invent problems that they didn’t have with each other.

There was no Captain America in this world, but the team of superheroes that have assembled were more than strong enough to take on a titan.

There was just one thing Steve had to change about the ending…

————

The infinity gauntlet was made of iron. Of course it was.

The stones connected together on an iron glove, and once Steve saw Tony on his knees, he ran towards Thanos and the pit of ash the two had created.

Steve fell to his knees beside Tony, and Tony gaped at him in abject horror.

“Steve,” he said hoarsely, “what’re you doing?”

Steve grasped one side of the gauntlet, Tony’s hand on the other side. He retracted his navy blue helmet, so Tony could see the determination in his salient eyes.

“We’re doing this together,” Steve said.

Thanos looked between the two of them, ready to smirk and laugh at something as trivial as love.

Before he could, Steve murmured, “make a wish, Tony.”

Tony’s eyes were welling with tears, and his lip was quivering, but he squeezed his eyes shut and did as he was told. Steve followed him, like he always did, and made the same wish.

Steve felt the world shifting all around him, but he forced his eyes closed so he wouldn’t see.

He could feel Tony’s pain, and he felt the fire burning through his iron suit, and he felt flames lick his skin, burning him irreparably.

He felt his lungs burn into nothing, and he felt both of them breathe their last.

————

Steve saw white, and was given a third life.

This one, once again, he had no control over.

————

Steve cried for Tony, and he cried for Peggy, and he knew he was destined to lose both of his loves.

The pain of three lives was enough to make him old, and sick, and hollow.

He used his final jump to return to the original timeline. He sat on a bench, and saw his old friends send him away two lifetimes ago.

He came face-to-face with Sam, and he gave him the shield.

Then, he gave himself permission to rest.

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and comments are appreciated!


End file.
